Shared Darkness

All the King’s Men
holds a special place in the heart for me, foremost because Robert Penn Warren’s
Pulitzer Prize-winning 1947 novel was assigned reading in my 11th grade honors English
class. My teacher was a real battleaxe in all the classic, stereotypical
strokes — pretentious accent, imperious stare and a wardrobe consisting wholly of
browns and greys.

She announced with a certain dark relish the first week the
difficulty of securing an “A” in her class, and a nine-point grading scale on
quizzes and essays that made it mathematically impossible to attain a 100%
score on any given assignment bore out this assertion. I think this was
supposed to be a masterful stroke of motivation. My response, though — instead
of busting hump for one of the four quarterly “A”s she doled out the entire
year — was to put myself on announced autopilot. I could pull a “B,” which
would still rate out at a 4.0 for college transcripts, with ease, so why put forth an emotional
investment that would unduly darken my disposition when grades were all too
predictably meted out?

This mindset colored my effort, certainly, as I devoted more
time to both extracurricular activities and endeavors in other classes where I
was perhaps less naturally gifted or suited. (Translation: stupid math!) I
would sometimes lag behind a bit in assigned reading, and when we had in-class,
pop quiz, short-form essays I would dress up my deficiencies in florid style —
an extended Top 10 list, for instance, on the symbolism of green light in F.
Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby.
My teacher would sometimes cluck disapprovingly, but I always graded out well
enough to hold onto my “B,” and besides, I think she secretly appreciated the
novelty and creativity involved, maybe even begrudgingly respected my adherence
to formula, namely: tackle the big exams, but don’t sweat the small stuff.

All the King’s Men
was assigned reading in the fall, and with other commitments and interests (why hello, ladies…), I read enough to get the gist of it, did the awful but
obligatory perusing of Cliffs Notes,
and consulted with a few friends on the text. Toward the end of the year — the
last week of class, I believe it was — I saw my teacher after school one day,
and bragged/confessed that I hadn’t finished reading All the King’s Men, or even really reached its halfway point. She
ran the traditional smack about me “cheating myself,” but I assured her it
wasn’t laziness that waylaid me, but rather a busy schedule. I would finish it
over the summer, I told her, and tell her what I really thought next fall.

All of this brings us to Academy Award winner Steven
Zaillian’s film adaptation, which I’m certain helped at least a few thousand
kids skip out on a reading assignment this past fall, and will — during its
long life on DVD — help tens of thousands more. A ruminative, well designed
work about the death of innocence and the corrosive nature of power, the film
suffers a bit from a bumpy opening — its main point of entry and flashback into
the story — as well as some marble-mouthed dialogue, but is an otherwise solid
and engaging telling of Warren’s classic tale of political corruption and
personal distortion. It captures with perspicacity altered form — how
character, like a runaway river, bends to pressure and frequently takes the
path of least resistance.

For those who similarly abandoned high school assignments
and never again took up Warren’s swampy text — rooted in the real-life story of
the larger-than-life Huey P. Long — Sean Penn stars as Willie Stark, an
idealistic, small town Louisiana politician who gets drafted into a run for
governor as part of a vote-splitting scheme by Tiny Duffy (James Gandolfini),
but eventually starts connecting with the blue-collar people of the extremely
poor state. Newspaper reporter Jack Burden (Jude Law) is initially assigned to
cover him, but falls under his charismatic sway, and eventually goes to work
for Stark when he wins his gubernatorial bid. In labyrinthine fashion, this
reconnects Jack with childhood friends Adam and Anne Stanton (Mark Ruffalo and
Kate Winslet, respectively) — well-heeled children of a political dynasty — and
also puts him at odds with his former father figure and mentor, the
well-respected Judge Irwin (Anthony Hopkins). The political framework is used
to explore some of the more profound dilemmas of human existence — sin,
forgiveness, guilt, betrayal, romance and redemption.

With his guttural rumble and wild, oratorical
gesticulations, Penn is a scenery-chewing delight, but it’s all in service of
the story, and the rest of the legitimately all-star cast — a phrase frequently
deployed in erroneous fashion — is quite solid as well, particularly Hopkins,
Gandolfini and Patricia Clarkson. Zaillian, meanwhile, nails the pent-up pathos
of Stark, best captured in a scene between the at-odds Penn and Hopkins which
culminates in the line, “I go more in pain than in wrath.” If there’s a knock,
it’s that the movie is dipped in mood and gloom to such a degree that it
prevents modern mainstream audiences without a predisposition for political
cloak-and-dagger tales from quickly picking up on the more basic conflicts in
the movie.

Presented in an Amray case, All the King’s Men comes with a nice, 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen
transfer, buoyed by solid blacks are clear detail. There are no problems with
grain or edge enhancement. Audio comes in a Dolby Digital 5.1 track, with a
French language Dolby surround track also available, as well as optional English
and French subtitles. A smattering of featurettes kicks off the supplemental
fare, including a six-minute making-of clip-fest, comprised of chats with cast
and crew, as well as inimitable executive producer James Carville.

Next up is a 13-minute look at Warren’s
book, entitled “An American Classic,” as well as a 23-minute mini-doc on the
aforementioned Huey P. Long. These are edifying, invaluable inclusions, nicely rooting
the film in the history of the text and its non-fiction roots. A location featurette,
detailing the shooting locale of Louisiana,
rounds things out on this front, along with a 10-minute, more overt look at the
movie’s themes of corruption. Three deleted scenes, including an alternate
ending, clock in at more than 20 minutes, and provide much more shading and
depth for Stark, and the bureaucratic corruption he encounters and to which he eventually
succumbs. For those feeling a bit shortchanged at his diminishment of
character, a few answers lie herein. Oh, and yes, I did finish reading Warren’s book, and tell my teacher about it; I highly recommend it. Maybe I’ll send her a heads up on this film as well. B (Movie) B+ (Disc)